Adobe tweak Webkit for interactive digital publishing [Video]

It's been tempting for many to write Adobe off, as HTML5 gathers pace and criticisms of Flash grow louder; still, having seen what the company is doing with the Webkit engine and tweaking it for digital publishing purposes, we wouldn't speak too soon. The company has been demonstrating a prototype text-wrapping, dynamic page layout for digital text, where words automatically reflow around call-outs and images that can be dragged about the page with a fingertip.

Video demo after the cut.

As the video shows, even irregular images - such as the handsome giraffe in the screengrab above - can be manipulated, with text automatically reworking itself accordingly. There's also an option to lock call-out text in-line with the regular paragraphs.

While the demo shows ebook content being navigated on an Android smartphone, what this could potentially lead to is more flexible digital content on the web, but suited to manipulation on small and medium screen devices such as cellphones and tablets.